190 Diva: pink

At I am the Diva Laura has asked us to honour her grandmother Ardath who passed away last winter due to complications from breast cancer.  October is breast cancer awareness month as well, so we are to use pink in our tiles.

I made a tile with lots of symbolism.   First, I chose to use a quilt-like pattern because quilts are an art form typically (but not always) made by women.  Each of the tangles I chose represent some aspect of woman (although I am aware that men, too, can get breast cancer). 

Kuke: to represent a woman's role in feeding her family
bateek:  to represent her role in clothing her family (and as an art form itself)
buttercup:  because all women deserve flowers
mumsy: for all the mothers out there
a heart: while not a tangle I wanted to use the heart to represent all the love and support we feel for the women in our lives
chemystery: for all the advances made by science that has made the survival rate for breast cancer much higher than it used to be
hopscotch: for all the children women take care of
holiday ornaments: for the role women play in making homes for their loved ones

And I hope Laura doesn't mind but I felt the need here to make a tribute to my own mother who died from pancreatic and liver cancer.  This is a particularly virile form of cancer with a very low survival rate.  My mother died five weeks after diagnosis.  And even though it's been 25 years, I still couldn't make this Zia without tears streaming down my face.

All the tangles have hearts in them:  heartstrings, heartvine, rose (couldn't figure out how to get the accent on the 'e'), Haley's hearts, leafheart, heartrope, heartfully